This RPG is a bit crap isn't it...

Not feeling invested into it, what it comes down to ( though this is largely subjective). Rated more objectively PoE could be close to BG II, but the latter blows it away for making the player empathize, laugh or get angry at whatever the game throws at you.
 
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On Rating systems:
As I am doing review-videos as a hobby I had to think about a score system. And at first I just wanted to give thumbs up and thumbs down as I found a score like 0 to 100 or even 0 to 10 too granular and yeah, which game would ever receive 2/10 for example.
But only thumbs up/ down doesn't really represent the whole spectrum as well. There are just lots of games with major flaws. So I also included a "horizontal" thumb.
But even that didn't really beat it, so I also included a thumb half way down and half way up, representing "rather good" and "rather bad". And to also represent an "awesome" game without any major flaws I included a golden thumbs up.
So in total I have:

Awesome!
Didn't have any RPG with this rating yet, but Fallout4 will probably my first one.

Very Good (minor flaws)
Basically most RPGs commonly considered in the 80-90% range by most other sides. Like Pillars of Eternity, Wasteland 2

Rather Good (some major flaws)
Games which have just enough issues that I can't fully recommend them to everyone in the target audience. Dungeonmans is the only example I could find spontaneously

Meh (major flaws which impact the overall experience quite a bit, but still somwhat worth to play)
Some examples would be Xulima with several "broken" mechanics, Torment with a completely disconnected and useless character system but a well written story, or Enderal with big balancing issues, lots of bugs and an empty world

Rather bad (the game has major flaws, but there is still something fun about it)
Deadstate would be my example here. Mechancs and balancing neither work on micro nor macro level. But I can't deny there is some fun hidden inside this mess. Jagged Alliance Online Reloaded is another example.

Really Bad (major flaws, not in the least fun)
This is mostly reserved for games which are utter garbage or which have one major game element which isn't working at all which overshadows absolutely everything. These are also games where I canceled my Let's Play as the game felt so bad wasn't the least fun.
Jagged Alliance Flashback would be my example of choice. I finished my LP here because I knew it was short. But the game is horribly broken.
But I'd also put (the old classic) Anvil of Dawn into this list with it's horrible combat mechanics which ruined the whole game for me. Blackguards 1 is actually another example. A tactics RPG which wasn't a bit tactical due to it's randomness, with horrible mechanics which overall was just a frustrating experience.
My last example would be Planet Alcatraz with horrible mechanics and story (and english translation)


On topic:
So, if you wanted to put my rating system in a 1 to 10 system, then I guess, most likely the "meh" (horizontal thumb) would be this mentioned 6/10 rating and the Rather Bad and Really Bad ratings would be the ratings below that.

So you can definitely have games which are that bad. Mostly because of having so broken and flawed mechanics that the majority of gameplay is just a frustrating mess.
And the mentioned 4/10 game from the original post would be something like my "rather" bad examples of Dead State or Jagged Alliance Online Reloaded. Games which have some fun elements, but are rather bad overall.

Of course everything is still subjective as mentioned before.

Also the question ofc is: What's the target audience of a game?
And you could argue that you just dislike a game because you are not in the target audience.
And I think you are partially right. Torment is a great example here. If this game wasn't advertised as RPG but as "Visual Novel with some RPG elements", then the rating would have been a different (better) one. I personally included "both" ratings in my review.
Tahira is on the opposite side of the spectrum. It's advertised as tactical RPG. But it has basically no RPG elements in it, and is pure tactical combat. I rated it as Very Good but with the addition that it's not an RPG.

Fallout 4 on the other hand will disappoint people who don't like shooter elements and so on. Guess that's why so many people also say that reading review is more important than checking the score.

Of course you could also argue that Planet Alcatraz is catering towards players who love broken mechanics and a trashy story and translation but I guess that would go to far. You could as well give a buggy and broken game a high score for the unique experience of participating in a beta test.
 
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I believe the Norwegian jury will need to reevaluate their scoring criteria! You can't say something is crap and then say the bolded bits about it! That defy any logic!
Not mine. :) (see below)
Will let ask a different question, will you recommend the game to anyone since you say its "hidden gem"?

The important part is this one: "I managed to disregard the problems". Therefore I could enjoy a game which I would classify as an overall bad game. But that doesn't mean that every part of it is bad. And personally, for completely subjective reasons, I found something to enjoy.

There were certainly better games I could have played. Why I chose to complete this one in stead - I haven't got the faintest idea.

Would I recommend it? If I have to say just yes or no, I refuse to answer. I would simply explain my experience with the game.

pibbur who may be too good at disregarding things.

PS: One more thing. I'm saying MM9 is a bad game (overall). I won't say it's crap. I may be wrong but when I see "crap" I expect something really, really, really bad. If we are using up words, what words do we have left when we really need them? PS.
 
I believe the Norwegian jury will need to reevaluate their scoring criteria! You can't say something is crap and then say the bolded bits about it! That defy any logic!

Will let ask a different question, will you recommend the game to anyone since you say its "hidden gem"?

He makes sense to me actually. I believe he is referring to games like Arcanum, which are bug-ridden and borderline hopeless in some aspects, yet would score 8 or 9 out of 10 any day. It might be down things like atmosphere, character, story or setting, things that might carry even a mess of a game if they're brilliant enough.

Edit: It seems pibbur replied roughly at the same time as I did.
 
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@pibbur who @Maylander

I do understand what you guys are saying but I was just being pedantic :)

However I feel that if something about a game that made me wanted to play it for very long time(not even to completion) then that aspect, whatever it is a *huge positive* towards the game which push it out of "crap" category automatically.

When I say something is "crap", then it means I dismiss it immediately and won't give it second thought. This is why I don't class any game where i spend lot of hours as "crap".
 
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I am in with Maylander. One reason I don't have a lot of low scores for games is that I avoid games I know I won't like or ones that seem questionable. While money isn't a major decision in game purchase for me I also don't want to waste it needlessly. So the only games I might rate below 7 are those I badly misjudged. Plus sometimes I may not like a game myself but it is otherwise very high quality (W3 is a prime example) so I won't score it low simply because of a personal pet peeve with the game. I can't remember the last game I purchased that I was very disappointment over. Never finished a few games but more because I just lost interest versus the game being deplorable.
 
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Not feeling invested into it, what it comes down to ( though this is largely subjective). Rated more objectively PoE could be close to BG II, but the latter blows it away for making the player empathize, laugh or get angry at whatever the game throws at you.
Lol so objectively PoE is no way close to BG2, sigh.

Continue deny that a lot of PoE writing is very weak to boredom is total non sense, deny that PoE totally failed the difficulty management in plain lie, and only that is two too huge burden to gameplay. But the list could go long, PoE companions are ridiculous achievements, at least in comparison of those of BG2, PoE hugely failed create the feeling of a wide country you explore because all wilderness areas are weak, and so on, and so on.
 
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I basically rate games like this :
"dropped the game after a few hours and never touched again = crap",
"dropped the game after a few hours, can't really get into it = passable",
"played once or spent many hours in it = ok" ,
"replayed but never finished = good",
"replayed any times = very good"

I tend to make "good choice" when buying games though, I have a pretty good idea what I like and doesn't like so I rarely get "crap" and "passable" unless I'm going through my backlog filled by humble bundle/star bundle or trying something because people told me it was awesome. A few of my KS ended up in passable and ok category though.
 
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I just ask myself one question: how much does this game resemble Fallout 3? :p

I don't know there are games that don't appeal to me but I can recognize they're "well made". I tend to get more disappointed with games I really thought I'd like like Dragon Age 2 (which does have some good things about it, but because of the awful combat just isn't fun to play…) Feel the same way about most RTwP games. I just can't enjoy them at all. Does that make them crap? I don't know, maybe they're OK and just not for me. Assigning a numerical score to a game just seems silly and arbitrary.

I don't finish a lot of games so merely finishing the game is usually a good sign I liked it. And playing it multiple times probably means it is one of my favorites.
 
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Gothic 3: Forsaken Gods instantly comes to mind. I'd rate that 4/10 even without most of the bugs.

Arcania is about a 5/10 from what I've played. I couldn't stomach more than 6-7 hours of it though, so that might not be fair.

I'd rate the Blade of Destiny remake a 3/10, though to be fair I haven't played it since about a month after it was released, and some people claim it has been improved significantly.

Dungeon Lords - 5/10

I'd probably rate the majority of JRPGs I've tried less than 6/10 :)
 
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Dragon Age 2 awful combat, really? The Witcher 3 combats and Skyrim combats are serious vomiting crap in comparison. Can't believe the total lack of analysis skills people can have when it's about Bioware games.
 
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Dragon Age 2 awful combat, really? The Witcher 3 combats and Skyrim combats are serious vomiting crap in comparison. Can't believe the total lack of analysis skills people can have when it's about Bioware games.



What you cannot seem to understand is that people have different opinions to you.

He said he doesn't like rtwp combat... you apparently do.

What is so hard for you ?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
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Jeez Joxer, you keep saying more and more odd things about The Last Remnant. Checkpoint save system?? Does finishing a battle count as a checkpoint?? You're going to have to replay it just so you can badmouth it more accurately!

Anyway, that kinda leads to a point derived from Maylander's point: the games that get slammed by experienced gamers are the games that fool them. And those games are typically ones that other people do like. The Last Remnant and Dragon Age 2 are both good examples of that.

Guess that's why so many people also say that reading review is more important than checking the score.
Exactly, Kordanor! You can say how much you liked a game easily enough but the purpose of a review is to lay out what's in a game so that the person getting the review can figure out if he/she is going to enjoy the game. The score is probably only going to reflect what you thought of the game and, at best, would just reflect what the average player would think of the game.
 
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Dragon Age 2 awful combat, really? The Witcher 3 combats and Skyrim combats are serious vomiting crap in comparison. Can't believe the total lack of analysis skills people can have when it's about Bioware games.

You are beginning to come across as someone who doesn't have much common sense...

When people say DA2 combat is crap they are implicitly comparing to similar games i.e. mainly past BW games where they have done RTWP. Specially DA1 or even Baldur's gate etc.

People around here also say SKyrim combat is crap and to some extent Witcher 3 is bad as well. When they say that they are comparing it to action combat games like Dark Souls etc. They are not comparing to Wizdary 8!

You can if you want compare Dark Souls combat to Wizdary 8 and choose action combat to turn based combat but at this point you might as well compare apple to an orange!
 
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You are beginning to come across as someone who doesn't have much common sense…

When people say DA2 combat is crap they are implicitly comparing to similar games i.e. mainly past BW games where they have done RTWP. Specially DA1 or even Baldur's gate etc.
And you believe I don't know? Wrong. I prefectly know what he was meaning but if you believe any reader will, then you are quite naive and should read a bit about manipulation.

I won't start over the arguing on DA2 and DAO combats, but such post I answered had no reason to bring in DA2 combats and highlight them as sort of worst combat ever. Not mention that its in comparison of DAO and that many major RPG have much worse combats, is manipulation, just an occasion to spread hate on Bioware.

Hateboys make me vomit.
 
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And about Rtwp combats, it's not PoE with combats around some door, systematic sneaking and long range first attacks, that can match DA2 combats finesses and diversity.

And for the lack of tactical view instead of kid whining, see it as an additional challenge to position a character at a right position to have a good global view of the combat, or pause and mentally build the global view by checking view of multiple characters and look all around for each.

Compare any RPG with DAO combats is just unfair with the extreme attention to design and tune every combat. DAO combats make ridiculous almost all RPG combats anyway, DAO combat system is another matter and no way clearly better than this in DA2, at least the infinite potions are an utter crap in DAO.
 
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For me, it would be combination of this: top-down view, round-based combat, party management, boring characters/NPCs, uncompelling music, a bland/generic High Fantasy setting like Forgotten Realms, a generic story without surprises.
Which is all quite personal, of course.
There were just very few RPGs I didn't finish, most notably Dungeon Siege and Neverwinter Nights. After those, I simply steered clear of their sort.
 
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Under what circumstances would you be happy to freely come to the conclusion that the RPG you just tried to play was actually pretty crap?

It does not take that much for a game to be crap for me. A personal sub 6/10 if you may. but games I don't like are not games I would always rate sub 6/10 if I were to rate them for others.

Things that can kill a game for me, that are not technical issues:

-Game feels overly repetitive. A game being repetitive and a game feeling repetitive are not always the same thing. Some games are able to get away with having little variety due to how that "little variety" is presented. Showering you with samey combat encounters is a good way for a game to end up feeling repetitive.
-Games that keep wasting my time. With this I mean games where you constantly have to wait for things. Be it because the characters move slowly, or because the game is turnbased and has long animations, or just a lot of running back & forth. I often find myself preferring no animations to the Final Fantays 7-style of doing things. Also, games that just keep having dead ends for no real apparent reason. Have you've played Menzoberranzan? You know all those empty rooms that you still have to go through because you need to look for keys and such? That sort of stuff also really bugs me.
-Poor writing. Poor writing is really more damaging to a game than a poor story, at least to me. I've dropped several games because the writing was bad. Poor translations can also be a major issue.
-"Unfair" things. Random death traps, spells that instantly kill your character after a failed saving throw, over-reliance of random outcomes where the difference between a good and a bad result is huge (like getting massive damage spikes), that sort of stuff.

And of course, things like general lack of balance, technical issues, bad stories and that sort of stuff can push a game into crap territory, but the above ones are the common culprits for me.
 
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Under what circumstances would you be happy to freely come to the conclusion that the RPG you just tried to play was actually pretty crap?

It does not take that much for a game to be crap for me. A personal sub 6/10 if you may. but games I don't like are not games I would always rate sub 6/10 if I were to rate them for others.

Things that can kill a game for me, that are not technical issues:

-Game feels overly repetitive. A game being repetitive and a game feeling repetitive are not always the same thing. Some games are able to get away with having little variety due to how that "little variety" is presented. Showering you with samey combat encounters is a good way for a game to end up feeling repetitive.
-Games that keep wasting my time. With this I mean games where you constantly have to wait for things. Be it because the characters move slowly, or because the game is turnbased and has long animations, or just a lot of running back & forth. I often find myself preferring no animations to the Final Fantays 7-style of doing things. Also, games that just keep having dead ends for no real apparent reason. Have you've played Menzoberranzan? You know all those empty rooms that you still have to go through because you need to look for keys and such? That sort of stuff also really bugs me.
-Poor writing. Poor writing is really more damaging to a game than a poor story, at least to me. I've dropped several games because the writing was bad. Poor translations can also be a major issue.
-"Unfair" things. Random death traps, spells that instantly kill your character after a failed saving throw, over-reliance of random outcomes where the difference between a good and a bad result is huge (like getting massive damage spikes), that sort of stuff.

And of course, things like general lack of balance, technical issues, bad stories and that sort of stuff can push a game into crap territory, but the above ones are the common culprits for me.


I won't start over the arguing on DA2 and DAO combats, but such post I answered had no reason to bring in DA2 combats and highlight them as sort of worst combat ever. Not mention that its in comparison of DAO and that many major RPG have much worse combats, is manipulation, just an occasion to spread hate on Bioware.

Hateboys make me vomit.


The problem with DA2's combat was not main combat system itself, but the encounter design being crap.

I find your last bit funny after you made a statement like this:

Dragon Age 2 awful combat, really? The Witcher 3 combats and Skyrim combats are serious vomiting crap in comparison. Can't believe the total lack of analysis skills people can have when it's about Bioware games.
 
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The problem with DA2's combat was not main combat system itself, but the encounter design being crap.

I find your last bit funny after you made a statement like this:

Encounter design is much more tuned in DA2 than 99% of crap Skyrim combats that are just a pack of enemies thrown in some non significant place, and if you don't have the analysis skills to realize that, Im' just sorry for you and you brought me the point.

Now that encounter design is a crap is your opinion and not mine. So what? You get hurt because of reinforcements? Your problem as I already explained:
- No way this destroy tactics it just involves managing an endurance aspect and tactics adaptation which is still tactics.
- Even two combats with reinforcement don't make them similar in DA2. On the whole game there's still a lot diversity coming from design of each combat. There's only one potential sequence, but depending of quests order, where the game fails by allowing a series of thieves combats that feel similar. In fact they are still different, and it involves not more than 3 or perhaps 4 combats. And you won't find anything like that anywhere in DA2.
- Reinforcement are too unrealistic, wrong, many cinematic of reinforcement are badly done, it's just visual details. It changes nothing to combat design. Enemies coming from elsewhere spawn not far enough, visual detail it changes nothing to combat design. Enemies jumping from roof and windows of a building in a street where they ambush you, pretty realistic, just bad visuals, visual detail it changes nothing to combat design. This point is just from superficial player giving too much credits to visuals, that's not core of combat design.

EDIT:
You should play Go, it's a game with only reinforcements, and it's "awful" they can spawn anywhere, and there's zero realism, and bad visuals. It doesn't make Go less tactical nor less strategical.
 
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